


merry christmas, war is over

by stonerjohnlaurens



Series: holiday ham [4]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, But honestly none of this is relevant to the main ship, Christmas, Dolley is an aro bisexual, Genderfluid Marquis de Lafayette, Insecurity, Jealousy, Lamsburr, Minor Gilbert du Motier Marquis de Lafayette/Hercules Mulligan, Multi, Not relevant to the plot but: Theodosia and Peggy are trans and John Jay is Bigender, Open Relationships, Polyamory, Recreational Drug Use, Stoner John Laurens, Trans Aaron Burr
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-25
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-12 00:02:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9046067
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stonerjohnlaurens/pseuds/stonerjohnlaurens
Summary: John tells a small lie, and he has to do damage control.





	

**Author's Note:**

> these amazing ass authors: hey vic write us a christmas fic  
> me, a black muslim who celebrates kwanzaa with no concept of time: alright
> 
> i hope you guys like this!! it was an honor to be added to this collaboration <3 happy holidays!

“Did you buy him a present?”

 

John had scowled at the question. Of course he didn’t fucking buy him a present. He doesn’t even like the guy.

“Yeah,” he had lied. He’s gotten really good at that, lying with a straight face. It’s a skill he had to master in the Laurens household growing up. Morally it’s not the best, sure, but it prevented him from getting a smack to the back of the head now and then.

Alexander smiled so beautifully, so sincerely, so sickeningly sugary _sweet_ that John felt _bad_ for lying to his face like that. He nearly apologized on the spot. Alexander didn’t deserve that. He knew that. But whatever. That was last week.

Now it’s December 24th, way past sundown. He’s higher than the planets, trying to escape his responsibility somehow. Lafayette’s guiding him around the mall, tutting and judging his every move.

“Why didn’t you just get him a gift when you said you did?” Lafayette asks.

 _Because that would’ve made too much fucking sense_ , John thinks to himself. But he swallows the sass quickly. Taking his frustration out on Lafayette won’t change the fact that he didn’t buy Burr a gift yet.

But see, John doesn’t even _like_ Burr. He can barely stand him. There’s never been a pressure to get him a gift before. In his 20-something years of life, he’s known Burr for only a few months. He’s never been invited to one birthday or one party at his house, never even said “hey there” to the prick in public when they’d bump into each other.

See, Alexander likes Burr. Well, he doesn’t, but they’re fucking. It’s complicated. Alexander’s been seeing Burr for a few months now.

And, really, John doesn’t mind. He knew that Alexander had a tendency to date around, see other people. They never stuck around too long, though. The longest he’s ever seen is three months, and that was a very odd affair with one of his sworn enemies, Thomas Jefferson. Since then, no one’s really came close to the relationship John has with Alexander.

Alexander’s never had a fuckbuddy as long as he’s had Burr around, save for John, and John’s been with Alexander for years.

Alexander bought an apartment, though, and they’ve all cohabitated for a bit. The summer. It was forgiving and short, days punctuated with long kisses and frantic, kind breaths. The heat wasn’t even as relentless as expected. Things were looking good.

But jealousy still tugged at John’s heartstrings. He wants to be okay with all of it. He really does. He’s just so different than Burr.

“Consider it a peace offering,” Alex had said. He wants him to get his a gift so that Burr feels welcome around them. John didn’t have the nerve to wipe that optimistic smile off of Alex’s face, tell him that _I don’t fucking want him to be comfortable around me, I hate his goddamned guts, I’m not just going to give him a gift_. He’s not heartless like that, wants Alexander to be happy. He understands that Alexander is starting to develop serious feelings for Burr, but…

 

“Burr’s not that bad,” Lafayette’s saying, making sure John doesn’t tumble down a flight of stairs or run into a mall Santa. Lafayette is documenting the entire thing on his cell phone for posterity. “December 24th, 9:00pm. Eastern Standard Time. From here on in—”

“Get the—fuck you man.” John pushes the phone away. “He is _so_ that bad. He’s a complete buzzkill. I don’t even know what Alex sees in him,” John replies. His voice is gravelly, throat wrangled and strained from years of constant smoke inhalation.

“Perhaps his way of fun is just a little different than yours.” Lafayette guides John into a clothing outlet of some sort. He picks up a blouse and holds it up to his own torso, sort of models it in a mirror. “What do you think of this one?”

“His way of fun is something called _boring_ , Laf.” John looks his friend up and down. “It’s cute. Flatters your body type, I think.”

“It’s cute? Oh yeah, that totally helps me.” Lafayette waves down an employee. “Excuse me?”

“Yes?” The worker replies, rushing to accommodate her customers. She’s visibly stressed, and John almost asks why, but then he remembers the date.

“Do you think this shirt would get me laid? Like, I need my boyfriend to look at me on Christmas morning and fuck me directly under the tree. No words, just,” Lafayette makes a crude gesture with his hands. “Straight up, dick out, fuck me under the Christmas tree.”

“Um…” John jumps into the conversation when he sees the horror spread across the worker’s face. He musters a poker face so no one points out how inebriated he clearly is. “I think what my friend is saying is that they—”

“He, right now. He/him.” Lafayette whispers.

“That HE would like a second opinion on how this blouse looks on him. His boyfriend is a bit of a textiles engineer himself so, we need to impress him.”

The worker sighs. John wants to tip the employee right here, right now, for dealing with their shit like this. On the _night_ of Christmas Eve! Surely she has a family of her own she’d rather be with.

“Look, I’ll help you guys pick something out, okay? It’ll give me a break from inventory work.” She looks around to make sure her supervisor isn’t watching them. “I _really_ hate doing inventory.”

Lafayette squeals and John nods in approval. He can procrastinate a little longer and enjoy his high without guilt for a little longer, too.

 

 

“I’m excited to see Dolley’s place,” Lafayette says casually as he’s driving them both back. “We haven’t partied with her in a while and I miss her. I wonder if much has changed about her.”

They decided to buy around 12 blouses, because it seems the worker was just as indecisive as Lafayette. Lafayette’s a trust-fund baby, though. He doesn’t bat an eye at overspending, especially on himself.

“Not much, I don’t think, besides the whole wheelchair thing. I think she lives on a lease with Theodosia and Catherine now. She’s thrilled to see us too, and I’m pretty sure she’s honored that we’ve chosen her to host Christmas this year. She’s been texting Alex and I pictures of the Christmas tree for weeks.”

“Oh, Theodosia’s going to be there?”

“I’m not sure. She might go upstate with her family.”

“I hope she shows. I don’t want to be the only trans person there….again.”

John pats Lafayette’s shoulder appreciatively. “You won’t! I promise you won’t! There’s potentially Theodosia, and Peggy, and John Jay might stop by…and…” John puts his head in his hands contemplatively. “I feel like I’m missing someone.”

“Hm…” Lafayette blinks. He can’t think of them either.

“FUCK!” John shouts. “FUCKING BURR!”

“Oh, Burr is trans, isn’t he? Well, good then.”

“No, Lafayette, I didn’t fucking buy Burr his gift!”

“Oh….” Lafayette sucks a breath in through his gritted teeth. “Sucks,” he concludes.

“Lafayette…we have to go back to the mall.”

“John, it’s 11:00 pm. The mall is closed, and now it’s about to be Christmas. Everything’s closed. Plus, this is New York. Driving’s already a bitch here, we’re not getting back until midnight as it is, at the absolute earliest.”

“Fuck.” John thinks of Alex’s sweet, trusting smile again. “Fuck!”

“My sentiments exactly,” Lafayette agrees. “Sorry, man, this is completely on you.”

John resigns to punching the dashboard, because he knows that Lafayette is right. The passenger side airbag comes out and hits him back. Lafayette barely flinches, watching karma work its magic. Once Lafayette drops John off in front of Alex’s apartment, John flops over face-first into a pile of snow. He screams into the fallen flakes.

 

 

Christmas morning creeps up like something sinister. Another blanket of snow has fallen overnight, and Alexander groans at that fact as soon as he opens his eyes. Burr slept elsewhere for the night, so it’s just Alex and John, and John takes this opportunity of privacy to start off his Sunday right. He turns to face Alex, blinks the sleep from his own eyes and smooths the crinkles out from the corners of Alex’s, kisses his soft lips and melts into something sublime and lovely, something slow and nice and so full of _love, pure love,_ that Alex isn’t even bothered that they’re a little late to get up.

It’s 10:00am now. They’re supposed to meet everyone at 10:30, at Dolley’s place. Alex tries to moan out _we’re late, c’mon, let’s actually get ready,_ but the third orgasm hits him and racks his brain so much he can barely get a syllable out.

John is proud of himself.

It’s a 40 minute ride to New Rochelle, and the couple doesn’t get on the train until about 11:00am. John wishes that he could lie and say he feels bad.

Not too many people are on this train thankfully—not nearly as many as there could be, anyway. They even managed sitting room. Alex clutches at his large bag of presents and John does the same, suspicious of the strangers around them.

“Hey.” Alex says. “I’m really glad you got Aaron a gift. I know I said that before, but I just really want you to know how happy I am that you guys are getting along.”

“Uh-huh.” John waves him off. “It’s nothing.”

“Oh, but that’s where you’re wrong, my dear Laurens. You don’t know how much this means to me. You mean the world to me.”

John blushes. “C’mon now, you’re just saying that because I sucked your dick this morning, knock it off.”

“I mean, that certainly helps my feelings towards you but, ah…” He trails off. John is thankful.

They finally show up to Dolley’s at around noon. To their surprise, no one’s opened their gifts yet.

“I see you guys continue to run on CPT,” George remarks, trying to relate to his new friends, clearly.

“Watch it, white boy.” Alex says, sternly. He walks in and kisses Dolley on the cheek. “Dolley. It’s been some time. Merry Christmas.”

“You guys are late,” she replies. “But it’s alright. We didn’t open anything yet just for you guys.”

“Oh, y’all really shouldn’t have,” John says, not wanting to grab the spotlight too much.

“Oh, but we did!” Lafayette sounds annoyed. “Now get your ass inside, we want to open the gifts.”

 

 

John got a pretty nice haul. George, new to the group, decided to tread lightly and just got him a 25$ gift card. Catherine does the same. Hercules knitted John a beanie with his name embroidered into it, and Lafayette bought a matching cashmere sweater. Maria bought him a vinyl record that John’s been talking about for ages. Dolley got him a fancy calculator because she knows that he failed math in one year of undergraduate and she hasn’t stopped talking about it since. Theodosia gets him a phone case shaped like a turtle. The Schuyler sisters got John a goddamn motorcycle, which John frankly lost his shit over. They’ve always been the most extravagant of the bunch, though, so it’s not too much of a surprise. Peggy, just as much of a stoner as John, gives him a follow-up best friend gift: a bong with a turtle on it. John Jay is rarely around, so he only gives John a card (with no money in it). James Madison doesn’t get him anything, and that’s fine by John. They don’t really have much of a relationship at all, so it’s fitting.

Alexander bluffs at first and says that the constant sex is a gift, and John rolls his eyes. Alexander then goes _Surprise! Oh my god, I so got you, huh?_ and hands him a gigantic gift bag. Inside is a Nintendo 3DS and a few games John’s had his eyes on for a while. There’s also a neon-yellow lighter (It glows in the dark! Babe, the lighter, look, cup your hands around it and—yeah, like that! Cool, huh?) and a matching pipe, and a few books that John’s really wanted.

“Babe…” John says softly. “This is…”

“Don’t lecture me about spending!” Alex says, curt and stern. “I’ve been saving up for months. Don’t you do it.”

“What? No, shut up. Come here.” John grabs Alex by the hair and plants a kiss on him. There’s some _aww_ -ing from the surround group of friends, and a quick “ _gross_ ” from Dolley.

John hands over an even larger bag to Alex, and Alex blushes.

“I can’t take this,” he says.

“Shut the fuck up and open it.”

John got him a chrome book, an external hard drive, a fountain pen, a designer jacket, and a shit-ton of books. John thinks his gifts are a bit inferior to Alex’s but Alex nearly jumps him right then and there anyway.

There’s a knock at the door.

“Burr!” Alexander says, pulling away from John.

“Oh, Burr.” Lafayette says in John’s direction, knowingly.

“Burr…” John groans.

“Good afternoon, everyone,” Burr greets the room as he steps in. He kinda bows with his entrance, and John can’t fucking stand how perfect and respectable he is all the time. “Merry Christmas. Alexander…” He trails off and looks into his lover’s (boyfriend’s?) eyes. “You look great. And you, Laurens.”

“Burr,” John spits, just as formal. He needs to try harder to be okay with him.

“I got you, ah…” He shuffles in his backpack and hands John a small gift. It’s immaculate, wrapped perfectly and donned in silver. “I hope I’m not overstepping, but I got you a gift.”

John rips into it, and he’s not disappointed. Burr’s gotten him a tiny stash jar labelled _“its 4:20 somewhere,”_ and he’s even gone through the trouble of filling it up and decorating the jar with fake ornaments.

John feels like a piece of shit.

“You would not believe what I had to do to get this,” Burr laughs nervously.

“I didn’t get you anything.”

“What?” Burr replies.

 _“What?”_ Alexander says as well.

“I was jealous—I allowed myself to forget,” He starts.

“John, you don’t have to…” Lafayette pipes up.

“No, I do. This is the nicest fucking gift anyone’s given me. Besides Alex, of course. It’s kind of hard to beat his gifts, I mean, come on. Point is—” He makes an exasperated noise. “I forgot. I really did. I put you in the back of my mind because I didn’t think you even liked me—”

“John. It’s quite alright. I didn’t expect anything, really.” Burr says, hand on his chest. “I should’ve said something to you at first. It’s a lot of pressure, I’m seeing now, and I know how hard it is to enter a new relationship with someone, platonic or otherwise. I guess I—,” He sighs. “I was a little hopeful because this is the first Christmas I’ve had with a solid family since…” He stops. “I don’t think I’ve ever had a Christmas with a solid family.”

Everyone’s quiet. Lafayette makes a big show of escorting the others into the kitchen. Hercules follows his lead and tries to provide a distraction, telling the group about him and Lafayette’s engagement.

“I need to take…a second.” John grabs Aaron by the arm. “Come with me, Come on.” They run outside.

 

 

“John, like I said, I didn’t expect—”

“I like you,” John says. “I actually like you. I’m realizing that. For you, I mean. It’s not just the gifts.”

“John…”

“I do, okay? You’re just really fucking perfect and I want to hate you. I don’t know I just…” He can feel himself starting to cry but he doesn’t—it’s too cold outside for all that. Snow is falling lightly.

“It’s just I feel like Alex likes me because I’m broken like him,” John breathes out after a moment of internal conflict. “We’re both idiots. We both…We both don’t know what we’re doing. And then you show up. Mr. Perfect Grades and even more Perfect Skin. You’re handsome and attractive and you’re smart and you have a solid job lined up and you don’t smoke and you don’t have depression and you _don’t_ put Alex through emotional trauma or hospital bills and you just—” He curses under his breath.

“You don’t think he’ll ever tire of you, John, do you?”

John is quiet.

“John Laurens, answer me.”

“I mean,” He laughs. “Everyone else does, so.”

“John…” Aaron pulls John in for a hug. “I know this is hard for you to deal with, and this is going to be even harder for you to hear, but Alexander loves you.”

“Stop it…”

“No, you got your turn. My turn. Alexander is obsessed with you. That’s poor wording but I can’t even say it’s just love, it’s something so much more it’s—God, John, don’t be dense. You’re everything to him. He’s always talking about how smart you are and how cute and how you always smell of—” Aaron presses his nose into John’s chest and sniffs, and it tickles John. John giggles. “Yep, there it is: rosemary. He loves your smell and your hair and the crazy things you say when you’re high and I’m glad I’m not a jealous man because if I was—Well,” Burr laughs, too. “I’d be having a breakdown in the snow in New Rochelle.”

John hugs Aaron back with earnestness. “I do like you, Aaron. I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry too, John, and I like you as well. It’s okay.”

“You’re a really good guy. I hate that about you.”

“Hey, now.” Aaron laughs again and nuzzles into John. John places a protective hand on the small of Burr’s back.  “We’re making up. Let’s be civil.”

They still have a lot of work to do. A _lot_. But it’s alright.

They go back inside. Alex is sitting there on the couch, drinking hot cocoa while the others are opening their gifts, still.

“Hey, hey!” Alex stands up. “How are my favorite men in the entire world?”

They both smile at him, resulting in a smile back. That sweet, beautiful, Alex smile. They curl into Alex’s sides, Aaron to the left and John to the right, and settle into the couch.

“That’s not much of an answer, you know.”

“Shush, Alexander, talk less.” Burr says, and he reaches over Alex to put his hand over John’s. John doesn’t even flinch.

 

**Author's Note:**

> seems alexander doesn't mind lying that much (very fitting for his character)  
> i'm stonerjohnlaurens on tumblr, hijabiheaux on twitter (or gayjohnlaurens)


End file.
